A Hogwarts Christmas Carol
by Nearly headless Natalie
Summary: After the war, Severus Snape is still the same miserable man as before. Can four familiar spirits teach the Potion's Master the joy of life and Christmas in one night? Ebenezer Scrooge, meet your match.
1. Pettigrew's Ghost

_ Disclaimer: I am neither J.K. Rowling nor Charles Dickens (although it would be a lovely Christmas gift if I was...). Therefore, I claim neither the characters or overall plot as my own. The Weasley-Granger children are my creations, as well as two original characters which will turn up in the fourth segment. Much of the dialogue is based from Dicken's story, so I take credit for only the revisions, not the actual text itself.   
_

_I actually wrote this story pre HPB, and I have now edited it to fit with the book. One of the spirits have actually changed sexes as well as characters, and there have been other minor changes. If there is confusion about anything, I assume it was an editing mistake and I will gladly rectify it._

_Lastly, this is a Christmas story...not a Nobel Prize winner for best literature--it's supposed to be fun and a little silly. I did, however, make an effort to keep Severus Snape canon, but had to contend with the difficulties of "thawing" him. I hope my efforts will not be in vain. Without futher ado, please enjoy the story and have a joyful Christmas season.  
_

_Part One: Pettigrew's Ghost_

Peter Pettigrew was dead. There can be no doubting this fact or working one's mind around it--he was as dead as a door nail, a coffin handle, a plant left outside of the Hogwarts Greenhouses for winter--in short, was very much departed from this earth. If one cannot understand this fact--oh skeptics, how little enchantment you see!--than this little tale can have no magic. Peter Pettigrew was very much dead.

Severus Snape knew of Pettigrew's death quite well--as he had narrowly escaped it himself. While harboring the last of the Death Eaters in his home at Spinner's End on Christmas Eve, including the unfortunate Peter Pettigrew, Snape stepped outside to bring some victuals for his stowaways. When he returned to feed them, he discovered that the Order of the Phoenix had discovered the Death Eaters hiding in Snape's house from an anonymous source, presumed that Snape had set this up as a trap for the Death Eaters, and burst into his house while he was gone. Most of the occupants escaped, only to be captured a few days later. Bellatrix Lestrange was captured and promptly put into Azkaban, along with her husband. Antonin Dolohov also followed them, after putting a decent fight. But Peter Pettigrew, as Minerva McGonagall said, originally with sadness, but more recently with mockery, was never very talented when it came to magic. So, after a few ineffectual attempts to stun the Order members, Pettigrew, typical of his usual style, transformed into a rat, in an attempt to escape.

His plan seemed to work; while all the Order members saw him transform, it was ludicrously hard to shoot a spell at so small a target as a rat and, just to add further difficulties, it was very dark in Snape's ill-lit home.

But, just as it appeared the Peter Pettigrew had escaped by the whip of his tail yet again, he met his downfall--a rather ugly, bandy-legged ginger cat named Crookshanks, who had not only an appetite for mice in general, but for this particular rat, both figuratively and literally.

Crookshanks had accidentally Dispperated with the Order members when he fell off an overhead shelf and caught his claws in Alastor Moody's long cloak just as he was Disapperating. Thus, following the Order members lazily in the house, he walked through the door just in time to see Peter Pettigrew's little furry body propelling right at him.

Crookshanks, it was said later by all, had a funny expression on his squashed face, almost as if he was trying to smile. Then, just when the rat realized the danger it was in, Crookshanks lunged forward and opened its great mouth--

Well, imagination can surely paint the picture of what happened well enough.

Snape, who had been playing the double-agent for many years, was hailed as a hero by the Order, for conniving a trap so cunning for the Death Eaters. While originally the Order had considered him a traitor for killing Albus Dumbledore, his assistance to Potter and his team of friends in discovering Voldemort's horcruxes had returned him to his position as a spy once more. He told the Order that Dumbledore had been dying already, that his murder was an act of mercy and not of vengeance.

Meanwhile, the truth was actually quite different. Severus Snape, the expert in Occlemency, the master of endless lies, had been double-crossing the Order all along. Dumbledore had, in fact, been dying, but it wouldn't have mattered to Snape at that point. The choice between his life and Dumbledore's was easy--Snape was a miserable man that wished nothing more than to live out his miserable life to the fullest. Also, on that fateful Christmas Eve night, he really _had_ been hiding the Death Eaters from harm, hoping that the news of both Harry Potter's and the Dark Lord's death was just a wild rumor. But, upon the discovery that both these deaths were real, Snape had no real choice but to help his former Death Eater comrades, as they were in his house, with their wands at the ready. While he had been toying with the idea of sending the Order of the Phoenix a note telling them that the Death Eaters were there, Snape never actually did. This remained a mystery, even to the brilliant Potion's Master. But finding it wiser and safer for him to pretend, Snape took the credit for the note and for the intelligent idea to leave the house for a little bit just so the Order could attack without himself being in anyway involved in it.

And so the wizarding world moved on. Harry Potter's name adorned everything--street corners, schools, even the birth certificates of children. The Dark Lord, who had been called He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named just years before was now spoken of freely, so that any child that wanted a really good insult, could call someone a "Voldemort."

The Order members, while they grieved for the death of young Potter, carried on with their lives. Remus Lupin married Nyphadora Tonks and named their twins, Sirius and James, after Lupin's departed friends. Minerva McGonagall became Headmistress of the reopened Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The Auror Department swelled as Harry Potter's former classmates, including Ronald Weasley, who married Hermione Granger not long after Lupin and Tonk's marriage, Ginny Weasley, Dean Thomas, Seamus Finnigan, and Neville Longbottom, who was the boy--now a man--who cast the final stunning spell at Bellatrix Lestrange the night of the raid at Severus Snape's home.

Everyone moved on--except for Severus Snape. He remained at Hogwarts, day after day, month after month, year after year. Seven years passed by the bitter Potion's Master, seven years since Pettigrew's death. Not as if Snape was keeping count--it didn't matter one bit to him that Pettigrew was dead, as he despised the rat anyway. But Pettigrew, had he been alive, shouldn't have been offended by this. Snape despised the world as a general rule and looked forward in expectation to every moment he could spend spreading this misery around.

So--now that I have proven that Pettigrew was dead and gone and that the world had long since forgotten his treachery, I can begin with the words that seem to accompany every magical tale.

Once upon a time, on Christmas Eve of the Good Lord's year, Severus Snape woke from his bed and scowled. I suppose there's no reason for this most unpleasant expression, for there was really nothing that horrible around him. But a scowl was Snape's normal expression on life itself, as if daring the world as a whole to give him its best shot. Needless to say, nothing terrible happened to Snape after that silently made challenge. After all, _I_ wouldn't want to be on the opposing end of that fierce glare.

Still, Snape continued scowling bad temperedly pulling on his solid black robes as if he were preparing for his own execution. In this process, he dropped his wand. Muttering furiously, he bent over and picked it up off the floor. But as he was coming up from his bent over position, he caught a glimpse in the mirror.

Snape had a strange disliking of mirrors. Some could say that he didn't want to see how truly ugly he was. Others, perhaps kinder and more insightful, thought that he couldn't stand to look at himself knowing all the atrocities he had committed. Whatever the case, Snape placed a spare cloak on the mirror on the chest of drawers in his room, so he wasn't able to see anything if he happened to glance in that direction.

However, this morning, the cloak was slightly askew, revealing the right hand corner. Snape saw himself in the mirror--a pale, emaciated face sporting a rather prominent hooknose and yellowish teeth, curtained by long, greasy, black hair, and a pair of piercing, fathomless black eyes that made even the fearless cringe inwardly. They were cold and indifferent, viewing life as one long meaningless farce that simply continued to use him as the butt of every imaginable joke.

Yet his reflection was not what caught his eye. In the very, very corner of the mirror, just below his ugly face, was another face. It was an equally unpleasant face, although not for the same reasons. It had a pointy noise, small, liquidly eyes that seemed to be darting everywhere at once, and a patch of thin, colorless hair. But the ghostly pallor and the expression on its face, in which describing as miserable would be a vast understatement, made even Snape's heart, which many don't believe exists, momentarily halt. Then, in a moment, it was gone.

Snape whipped around behind him aggressively, his wand drawn. But there was nothing behind him but his unmade bed, his bedside table, and a book he had been reading last evening.

His startled look hardened into an angry frown. "Bah--Humbug."

This certain outburst surprised him. Snape was custom to swearing quite fluently when students weren't around--sometimes even if students were around. But to use such a foreign curse at such a moment was strange for him.

"Bah," he said again, trying it out, "Humbug." His scowl softened slightly to a look of grim satisfaction. It was a good curse. It fit well.

Just as he vowed to use it on as many students as possible, especially the Gryffindors, Snape suddenly remembered that he didn't have classes that day, as it was the first day of Christmas break.

While this thought would have brightened his scowl when he woke up (as bright as it would ever get, naturally), now that he had a disparaging word to use against students, he didn't want to be denied the satisfaction of using it! So, scowling angrily once more, and not for the last time that day, Snape left the room, shutting the door tightly with a muttered, "Bah--Humbug!"

For both the facts that it was still quite early in the morning and that most of the students had gone home for Christmas break, the hallways were quiet and desolate. Snape walked slowly downwards, into his region of the castle, the dungeons. As he was going down, a suit of armor, charmed by Flitwick to sing carols, burst into a cheerful, baritone voice, singing "Good King Wenceslas." Snape flicked his wand out of his pocket--and a moment later, the suit of armor collapsed lifelessly on the floor, in pieces. The scowl on Snape's face was momentarily replaced with an unpleasant smirk, before reverting back to its sour self.

The gradual change from the warm upper levels to the coldness of the dungeons became suddenly evident when Snape let out a puff of smoke with his breath. Most people would think that the Potion's Master dreaded these frigid temperatures. But, in actuality, Snape enjoyed the bone-chilling climate of the winter more than any other time at Hogwarts. Some might say that he liked to see his students miserable--others say that Snape's heart was so frozen that cold no longer affected him.

He yanked open the door to his office unceremoniously and cast his customary disdainful glare at the corner, where his much hated student teacher, Hermione Granger Weasley, was seated at her desk.

She hadn't changed much since her last year at Hogwarts, just grown a little older. Her bushy hair was constantly pulled back in a bun (a messy one, which continually irritated Snape's obsessive compulsive nature) and her nose was always absorbed in either work or a book. At that time, she was wrapped up in at least two robes, by the looks of it, a Muggle jacket with a scarf and gloves, and her heavy black cloak. Still, she appeared to be cold. Snape shook his head contemptuously.

"Good morning, Professor Snape," she greeted him, her voice calm and neutral. She knew from experience that being either too cheerful would cause Snape to irritably ask what in the world was she so pleased about or too depressed would make Snape growl an order to stop complaining.

Annoyed that Granger hadn't given him any ammunition to strike her with, Snape simply grunted in return and sat down at his desk, his scowl deepening with thought.

He hadn't asked for a student teacher, as one can easily guess. But, due to the fact that Hogwarts had hired two homicidal maniacs, a fraud, a tyrannical Ministry employee, and a werewolf--twice (Lupin had taken over the position the year after Snape was pushed back to Potion's Master. Lupin was going to remain in that position until Granger could take on the job), McGonagall was forced to start doing longer screening for employees. For this reason, all people that were potential professors went through two years of training first, working under already established professors. Granger had spent her first year under the tutorship of Flitwick--and then McGonagall assigned her to Snape. Snape, with his usual pessimistic view of things, thought that McGonagall had done it on purpose, just to torment him. It didn't matter that Potter was dead--every time he looked at Granger (whom he still called by that name despite the fact she was married) he was reminded of Potter's former escapades.

In the midst of his dark thoughts, the door to the office abruptly snapped open. Snape glared at the intruder, but there was no one in front of him. Frowning, he looked down at his work again--only to be interrupted by a tiny, shrill clearing of a throat from behind Snape's enormous wooden desk.

Slowly, Snape peered over the edge and saw Filius Flitwick standing there, grinning happily. Flitwick was a tiny wizard, with a warm smile and laughing eyes. A Muggle might have likened him to one of Santa's elves.

"Merry Christmas, Severus," Flitwick said, in his squeaky voice.

"Bah," Snape muttered, perversely glad to use his new exclamation of annoyance, "Humbug."

Flitwick just laughed. "Surely you don't mean that, Severus? It's Christmas! What have you to be so gloomy about?"

"What is Christmas good for except to remind you that you're not a Knut richer, a day younger, or a bit more successful than you were the year before last?" Snape asked quietly, in a waspish, dangerous voice, "In my opinion, any fool that goes about this castle speaking the words 'Merry Christmas' should be boiled in a vat of my Draught of Anguish and be buried with a dragon claw through his heart!"

"Severus, really--"

"Let me keep Christmas as I see fit, Flitwick," Snape added darkly, "And I'll let you keep it your way."

"But you _don't_ even keep it," Flitwick wisely pointed out, "And, while it is true, that each Christmas merely marks off the passage of more time, I believe it has done the world a lot of good! It's a time of charity, of kindness, of compassion, of love. It's a time where all the earth's people, wizard and Muggle alike, can join together to celebrate 'peace on earth and goodwill to men.' For that alone, I believe Christmas has done me some good and that it will continue to do so! God bless it, I say!"

Granger, who had looked from her work to hear the poignant Charm's teacher, burst into a momentary applause. Snape gave her a scathing look that would have frightened a Dementor. Abruptly, Granger looked back down at her papers, seeming to hide behind them.

Frowning back at Flitwick, Snape smirked ironically. "Very…touching, Filius. Thinking of entering into politics at any time? The Ministry could always use more inspirational rubbish like that."

Flitwick smiled at Snape, his spirit not dampened by the Potion's Master's coldness. "No…but I have come here to ask you to come to my Christmas Party."

"Not a chance," Snape replied, "And if that is all, I wish you a good morning."

"I'm sorry you will not come, Severus," Flitwick sighed, "But I will still be hoping that the cold of these dungeons will drive you to warmer places."

"Good morning," Snape repeated, a little louder.

"And I wish you a most Merry Christmas, despite what you think of it," Flitwick continued, walking out the door.

"Good morning," Snape said once more, louder still.

"And a Happy New Year!" Flitwick added, swinging his little head into the door frame.

"Good morning!" Snape nearly shouted, looking down at his last assigned potion's homework.

"Good morning, sir."

Snape's head snapped up. As Flitwick was leaving, he let in two gentlemen. They wore nearly the same fashioned dark blue robes, with matching black cloaks. From this absolute unity of dress, Snape gathered that they were Ministry employees.

"Professor Snape, I believe?" said the first one.

"Yes," Snape replied, his voice an unfriendly growl.

"We're with the Magical Spell Reversal Committee," the second one said, after Snape had terrified the first one, "And it has come to our attention that you served in the Order of the Phoenix during the second war."

"Yes, what of it?" Snape asked, more angry than ever at the mention of that group.

"As you are a man of…special magical capabilities," the first one said, gaining courage, "We have come to ask for your assistance."

"Doing?" Snape asked, bored.

"The magical world is still not completely on its feet," the second man continued, "Crackpots still insanely loyal to the Dark Lord place terrible curses on objects, causing horrible pain and suffering for the Wizard and Muggle recipients…and the makers of these curses are usually so inexperienced in making them that simple, painful curses can actually result in a person's death."

"So we're asking for you to help us find these articles and their creators before they harm more innocent people," the first man finished.

Snape looked at the men with a look that could have been thoughtfulness, if he hadn't made up his mind already. As much as he despised teaching at Hogwarts, especially since returning to the position of Potion's Master, being one of the Ministry's mindless lackeys seemed worse. Snape was merely thinking of the cruelest way to turn them down.

"Tell me," he said, softly, very misleadingly, "Is Azkaban still being run by the Dementors?"

The two men looked at each other warily. "Yes, of course."

"And is the Aurors group still functioning?" Snape asked, still very quietly.

"As well as can be expected after the losses they suffered," the first man replied.

"And St. Mungo's," Snape continued, "Is that still open?"

"Yes, Professor Snape," the second man answered.

"Well, that's a great comfort to me," Snape replied, sarcastically, "Because from they way you were talking, I was afraid all these glorious things had closed. My mistake, I suppose."

"Then you wish to take the position?" the first man tentatively asked.

"I wish to be left alone!" Snape barked, making the two men flinch, "If those fine establishments are still up and running then I see no reason for a bunch of wizards and witches, twirling their wands like they're the next Albus Dumbledore, performing functions that should be taken care of by the Ministry!"

"But, sir," the second man exclaimed, "The Auror Department--St. Mungo's--they can't keep up with the demand! People are dying regularly!"

"Well, that would keep down the surplus population, now wouldn't it?" he coldly replied, "Good morning." Abruptly, he bent down over his work again, signifying that that meeting was over.

"Professor Snape," the first man implored, "We're asking for your help. For pity's sake!"

Sharply, Snape looked up from his work. "_Pity_? Let me tell you what pity is, gentlemen. It's weakness, masquerading as charity! It's infirmity parading as kindness! Pity is a way for humanity to allow themselves to fall back to laziness and lethargy, letting others do the things which they could be and should be doing themselves! That is what I think of your _pity's sake_, gentlemen."

The two Ministry workers realized the futility of insistence and left Snape to his work, giving him bad looks over their shoulders when they knew he couldn't see them.

Compared to the very active morning, the afternoon dragged by quietly, without a single person to interrupt the silence between the Potion's Master and the student teacher. As the hours went by, Granger's layers of clothing seemed to increase as Snape's desire to add fuel to the fire became less and less. While it would have taken only a quick flick of her wand to relit the fire, she knew that Snape enjoyed his chilling temperatures and would have a fit. And Snape…well, by this time even he was starting to become rather cold, but he knew that the room temperature was making Granger miserable…and there's nothing that a miserable person likes to do more than spread misery to others less abounding in the endowment.

Vainly, Granger tried to warm her hands by the light of her candle, but no amount of imagination from her mind could convince her that it was working.

Finally, just as Granger thought that she would put on her third and final set of gloves, she realized that it was four o'clock at last--time to go home. With an inaudible sigh of relief, she approached Snape's desk, the owner of which was bent over a book.

"I'm going, Professor," she said.

He looked up, frowning darkly. "I suppose you want tomorrow off, then?"

"Yes," Granger answered, her lips contracting slightly, "I've asked Professor McGonagall for permission and she's granted it."

"I suppose you'd think yourself…over-worked to be at your place of employment at Christmas," Snape sneered.

"It's one day out of the year, sir," Granger replied, her face still distant.

"And one day of work extra for me," the Potion Master said, "Just be sure to be here all the earlier the day after--I have you scheduled for early morning detention for some misbehaving Gryffindors. Cauldron scrubbing, my personal favorite."

"Very well. Have a nice--" Granger appeared to start to wish him a happy holiday, then thought better of it. "Good-bye."

Once Granger had left, Snape expected to feel rewarded at the peace…but he discovered, quite alarmingly, that a strange, foreign, unknown feeling had begun to pervade his mind--the office felt lonely without Granger checking papers at her desk. The dungeon room felt unusually large with him standing there by himself, amidst his potion's ingredients and jarred creatures. For the first time in a long time, he was isolated from mankind and wasn't enjoying it.

He tried to push these thoughts from his logical mind. As another one of his general rules, he despised all forms of imagination. They led to unproductiveness and daydreaming…and empty hopes.

Snape turned to the faintly glimmering fire. For a moment, an onlooker might not have recognized him. He sported no scowl, no dark frown, or a cynical smirk. His face was oddly distant and melancholy, as though thinking of something from long ago.

Then, abruptly, his face twisted itself back into an unfriendly scowl. His thoughts, engaged on something that happened so long ago, must not have been something he wanted to dwell on any longer.

"Humbug," he darkly muttered.

Sufficiently more himself again, Snape pushed out the last sparks of the dim fire with his foot, smashing them down with vindictiveness unusual in even Snape. His black robes billowing with his swift step, he closed the door to the office and walked to his room, not in the mood to eat dinner in the company of cheerful faces like Flitwick and Lupin.

He emitted a faint sigh of relief when he reached the door to his room. His plans for the evening were simple--eat a spare bit of soup that he would order from the kitchens and finish reading his book.

However, between Snape's unlocking the door to his room and stepping in, something happened that would affect the Potion Master's quiet plans for the evening.

On the door handle, a ghostly face appeared. It was the face that appeared in the mirror that morning--small watery eyes, a rat-like face, and a look of abject desolation that even the heartless Snape felt pity for--the face of the traitor Peter Pettigrew.

Snape barely managed to gasp in surprise before the ghostly face vanished, leaving only the familiar door knob. He stood in shock for a moment, looking down at the door knob as though it would bite him. Then, shaking his head very sharply, as if to cast away the sight he had seen, he opened the door (holding onto the doorknob for as short a time as possible), muttering about seeing things. Still, when he entered the room, Snape looked carefully into the shadows behind the door, underneath the bed, and in his sparsely-filled closet, his wand drawn all the while. After his search yielded no results, he frowned angrily at his own stupidity and said, "Humbug!"

After a House-Elf dropped off his ordered soup, he put on his long gray nightshirt and, in a strange moment of inspiration, a pair of slippers that Dumbledore had given to him on Christmas many years previously and had laid dormant in his cupboard since then.

Snape pulled up a chair, eating his thin broth distantly, staring into his small fire, which cast hardly any light at all around the darkened room. Once he had finished his soup, he took up his book and read hardly more than a paragraph about the dangers of swallowing too much Good Health Potion when he heard the first door slam.

One perhaps would not find this unusual in a castle full of people. But Snape's corridor was so far away from the other teacher's rooms (done on purpose, of course) that the appearance of any other person besides himself in the desolate hallway was a rarity, indeed. Snape's black eyes darted up from his book and glanced toward his door. Silence reigned for a moment. Shrugging half-heartedly, Snape turned back to his book.

But a second later, another door slammed. And another. And another. Soon it seemed that every single door in the hallway was slamming and shutting over and over again, with frightening rapidness. Snape was on his feet in an instant, glaring suspiciously.

"It must be one of Peeve's tricks," he said, apparently to himself, not noticing how unbelieving his own voice sounded.

Just as Snape was determined to go and investigate the noises, they stopped. Snape held his breath for a moment, listening. His patience was quickly rewarded--but the noise he heard this time was much worse. It sounded as if Filch had taken the manacles down from his office walls and decided to drag them all over the halls of the school--except that these sounded heavier. And with each sound, they appeared to be getting steadily closer to his room.

"Humbug," Snape remarked, "A student playing a prank!"

But, despite himself, his normally pale color had become even pastier.

The sounds suddenly stopped--right in front of his door. Snape had stopped breathing.

Then, a ghost drifted through the door. It's features were the same--a rat-like face with a sharp nose, watery eyes, and a mournful face. It was wearing what it had been at its death--a pair of brown pants, a button down Muggle shirt, and a brown jacket. There were only two differences: one, chains wrapped around his entire body. Heavy silver chains enveloped around his mid-section crept up his chest like a malicious ivy cluster and even wound around his legs and arms. Attached to the chain were books of Dark Arts, heavy, jeweled goblets of deadly potions, which, the Potion's Master in Snape identified, despite his momentary surprise at the ghostly spectacle, and several wands. Also, when Snape had seen Peter Pettigrew last, Snape hadn't been able to see through him.

Snape, of course, believed in ghosts--it's rather difficult not to whenever one sees them on a daily basis and is actually coworkers with one. But his brilliant mind refused to register the fact that Peter Pettigrew, seven years dead that very day, would possibly return to the dead now and come to Hogwarts.

"What do you want of me?" Snape asked, his voice quite steady.

"A good deal," the ghost replied, in Pettigrew's high pitched treble.

"Who are you?" Snape questioned again, his black eyes narrowing.

"You mean--who _was_ I?" the ghost asked in return.

"A rather finicky spirit, aren't you?" the Potion's Master observed, sarcastically.

The ghost slowly crossed the floor, dragging its legion of chains behind it. Snape, crossing his arms, watched the ghost settle on the stool by the fireplace.

"You don't believe in me, do you, Severus Snape?" the ghost asked in return, looking up at Snape with woe begotten eyes.

But Snape was immune to all sad faces and sorrowful expressions. He smirked unbecomingly and gestured to his empty dish of soup.

"I doubt your existence, indeed," he replied, "Because you can come from anywhere--a bad bit of cheese from breakfast, an underdone potato--yes, there's more of the soup than of the spirit about you!"

The ghost let out a terrible, chilling wail, rattling his chains along with it. If frightening Snape just enough to let go of his skeptical thoughts on the ghost's existence was the point of the cry, it was successful. Trying to ignore the racing of his heart, Snape attempted to pacify the spirit.

"All right--all right!" Snape exclaimed, resisting the urge to cover his ears with difficulty, "I believe you--you're real. Just stop that infernal racket! Now why are you here, spirit?"

The ghost stopped its moaning and shaking and turned its haunted gaze at Snape.

"It is my curse, along with the spirits of many others, to walk this earth to witness to those who do not know the horrors of what they are about to suffer--so they can change, unlike ourselves."

The ghost made a quieter but all the more miserable cry and rattled his chains in anguish.

"Why are you chained?" Snape asked warily.

"I've made this chain myself," the ghost explained, lifting the various books, "Every choice that I made, every thought that I had, every step that I took--day by day I made each and every link. Just as you have made your own chain."

Snape, despite himself, could not help looking behind him, to look for his own ghostly chain. Cursing at his temporary stupidity, Snape looked back to his ghostly visitor.

"Have you been traveling for seven years to come here, Peter Pettigrew?" Snape asked, finally admitting his identity.

Pettigrew grimly smiled. It was an expression of one that is experienced on a subject--and, as Pettigrew seemed to be pathetic in nearly everything that he had ever attempted in life--it was a strange expression to see on him. "Yes--and no. I have been studying the remnants of my life, looking over lost opportunities…and terrible choices."

"You were shrewd, Pettigrew," Snape said, sitting down in his seat, as he grew more comfortable with the ghost, "to attempt an alliance with the Dark Lord. You were looking out for your own well-being."

"My own well-being!" Pettigrew exclaimed, suddenly furious, "Yes--my own well-being--when I should have been interested in the well-beings of my friends--of those who cared about me!" He grabbed at his chain, pointing to the wands. "Each wand stands for a person I betrayed…there they all are, my friends, a constant reminder of what I failed to do. And this time of year, my chain is especially heavy…thinking of all the happy days I should be spending with them now, with James, Lily, Sirius, and Remus…thinking of all the Christmas holidays with someone to share them with!"

Suddenly, Pettigrew's doleful expression changed into a more business like expression.

"My time is short. I must tell you why I have come for you."

"Go on," Snape drawled, determined not to show all the interest he was really feeling.

"I have sat by you often, Severus Snape, watching you…knowing that you will never change your ways until you are like me. So I am giving you a chance to change your fate."

Although Snape couldn't begin to explain why Pettigrew, who he had always tormented and ridiculed, would possibly want to help him, Snape was too much of a Slytherin not to take what was handed to him.

"How, exactly?"

"You will be haunted--by three more spirits."

Finding Pettigrew's ghastly appearance the most he could take in one evening, Snape's frowned irritably. "Is this really necessary?"

"Unless you wish to be condemned to this," Pettigrew said, picking up his laborious chains, "The first of the spirits will come at one o'clock."

"Can't I have them all at once and get it over with?" Snape asked, his sarcasm biting, "Don't you know my _beauty_ sleep is important to me?"

Pettigrew ignored him. "The second will come at the stroke of two and the next will come at three. Listen to them well, Severus Snape--they are your only way out of this fate."

Just like that, Pettigrew rose from his seat at the fireplace and floated out the closed window, into the night sky.

Rising to his trembling legs (which he adamantly tried to pretend were not shaking at all), Snape walked to the window and opened it, looking up into the sky for the departed spirit. But there would be no hope of ever finding him--the sky was filled with ghostly apparitions, with chains dangling all around them, their cries chilling Snape to the core.

Swiftly, Snape shut the window, locked it, and sunk on his bed, his face almost as pale as Pettigrew's. He opened his mouth to attempt to say "Humbug," but his throat was too dry.

Normally, one would think that what Snape did was the last thing anyone would do in that situation. Perhaps it was the sheer exhaustion of his depressing day or the lateness of the hour--perhaps the stressfulness of seeing a long since dead co-traitor and a whole legion of chained spirits that tired him. Or perhaps the magic of the spirit cast its spell upon the alarmed Potion's Master. Whatever the case, Snape fell back on his bed and immediately drifted into a deep, dreamless sleep.


	2. The Ghost of Christmas Past

_Part Two: The Ghost of Christmas Past_

Snape woke with a start. As the haze of sleep began to fade away, he wondered what time it was.

"If it's near one," he remarked softly, "I should prepare for my next visitor."

Then, a delightful thought occurred to him. It was all a dream! Pettigrew's appearance--the chains--the battalion of phantoms in the sky--all due to some bad soup from the kitchens! He gently sighed, too relieved to began to berate himself on his foolishness.

The clock on Snape's bedside table struck one. He sunk deeper into his bed. Certainly no one was going to visit--

Suddenly, Snape saw light behind his bed curtains. And then, a pale hand drew back the curtain.

The ghost was a young man, as though on the verge of graduating from Hogwarts. He was tall, thin, and lithe, an excellent build for a Quidditch player. He was wearing a white tunic, with a tan cloak swirling majestically around his feet. In the hand that didn't open the curtain was a branch of fresh holly, looking like it was picked off one of the bushes in the countryside. The crown that rested on his messy black hair seemed to be made of pure light.

Snape took this sight all in at a moment. Then, with a snarl, he recognized the spirit.

"Potter?" he spat, "What are you doing here?"

The spirit blinked his bright green eyes behind black glasses a few times and laughed softly.

"I'm sorry," he answered, in a very familiar voice, yet without the scorn he normally addressed Snape with, "But I don't know who you're talking about."

Infuriated that not even in death did it seem that he could rid himself of The-Boy-Who-Lived-To-Make-His-Life-Hell, Snape snarled, "_You_ are the ghost I have been promised?"

"Yes," he answered gently, "I am the ghost of Christmas Past."

"Long past?" Snape asked, the growl still evident.

He shook his head. "No--your past."

While Snape found it disturbing that Harry Potter should be the spirit associated with his past, he realized that the spirit, however unpleasant the form it took, was not Potter reincarnated; the lack of overall hostility and the ambiguity of his statements was not what he associated with the former Gryffindor. Hoping to get this over with quickly, Snape grunted in return.

The Ghost of Christmas Past moved away from his bed and pointed to the window. "Come with me."

With a wave of his hand, the window opened and two ghostly broomsticks appeared. Snape tried not to make his gulp audible.

"You mean--fly?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.

The ghost nodded.

"I'm a mortal, I would sink right through those," Snape started explaining, "And I--I never did especially well with flying when I was in school, you see…"

"You don't have to be afraid of heights when you are with me, Severus Snape," the ghost replied, laughing again, grinning mischievously.

Snape stiffened immediately, that grin altogether too familiar from both James Potter and his blasted son. "I am _not_ afraid. It's--not my forte, that's all."

"These broomsticks can take you anywhere, Severus Snape, and safely as well," the Ghost said, drawing Snape from his bed with a tug that was gentle yet, at the same time, not to be denied.

A moment later the ghost and Snape were on the broomsticks and flying into the night sky. Snape took one look at the ground far below, felt his stomach do a queasy back flip, and determinedly looked at the ghost. Luckily, the view wasn't a long one--the sky vanished and suddenly they were on solid ground, outside of Hogwarts, during the morning.

Joyful peals of laughter echoed over the snow-covered grounds. Snape turned to see some of his Slytherin companions having a snowball fight.

"Why, it's Avery and Nott," Snape murmured, "They must be in their second year, at oldest…long before we had ever heard of the Dark Lord."

In place of the usual reverence in which he said the last two words was a dull, deadness. Briefly, Snape's poorly used imagination wondered what Avery, Nott, and himself would be like if the Dark Lord never had appeared in the first place.

"This is the school you attended, I believe," the Spirit said, "Do you recognize it?"

"Recognize it?" Snape sneered, shoving his broomstick into the ghost's hand, "I could walk around with my eyes shut!"

They walked into the school. Subconsciously, Snape started to walk toward the library.

"It seems to be deserted for Christmas," the ghost remarked, "But not everyone has gone, have they?"

Snape already knew who they would see when they entered the library--but it did not completely prepare him for the lurch of his so-called frosty heart he experienced.

The boy he saw was rather ugly and strangely put together. He had stringy black hair, a long nose, a pale face, and a pair of lonely, sad eyes. It was the younger version of Severus Snape.

"Yes, I remember this book," the older Snape murmured, "It was an idiotic book I suppose--all about wizards defeating great creatures and triumphing over incredible adversities and helping witches…but I did enjoy it so."

Snape sat down next to his younger self and started reading the pages. Before he knew it, the scowl which he always wore started to twitch upward--and upward--and upward--until one could almost say that Severus Snape, the cruelest, harshest teacher ever to teach at Hogwarts, was smiling.

Suddenly, he became evident of the fact himself and dropped the expression and muttered something about "stupid" and "ridiculous." The ghost gave no evidence of either seeing or hearing anything but only smiled slightly.

Suddenly, from the door of the library, a woman's voice gently called, "Severus?"

The forlorn child looked up from his book and smiled. "Mum!"

The older Snape stared avidly at the woman walking into the library. She wasn't exactly much to look at. She had thin, mousy hair and a long pallid face. Her face did look slightly more pleasant with a happy smile, looking at her son.

"Merry Christmas, Severus," Elieen Snape warmly said, embracing her only child, "Reading again, I see?"

The young Snape readily shook his head, his black eyes full of eagerness and delight. "Yeah, Mum--it's the best book--about these wizards fighting dragons and trolls--and saving witches-in-distress--and--"

"As much as I'd love to hear about your book," Mrs. Snape said, smiling ironically, much like her son, "I have an uncanny feeling that we'd never get around to opening up your present if I let you go."

The child smiled brightly. "What d'you get me?"

"Open it and see," his mother said, handing him the brightly wrapped package.

Impatiently, the boy ripped apart the paper, revealing an old, slightly tattered book entitled Advanced Potion-Making.

"Was this yours, Mum?" young Snape asked, his eyes wide, as his long finger traveled down the books spine lovingly.

"That's right," Mrs. Snape replied, "And I thought, since you've been complaining about you classes being too easy, that you could learn ahead with my old potion's book. Perhaps it'll keep you out of those Dark Arts books."

Young Snape looked up, his eyes full of innocence still. "But I like the Dark Arts books, Mum."

"Yes, I know you do," she replied, sinking into a chair, suddenly looking older, "But they…scare me a bit, Severus. Promise me that you won't get too involved with them--not when I'm still around to watch you grow."

The young boy nodded. "I promise."

He seemed to have sobered immensely since the mention of the Dark Arts book. Tentatively, he looked up. "Is Father allowing me to come home for the holidays?"

Mrs. Snape looked even older. "No, Severus…not this year. Perhaps next year."

The real Snape glared bitterly at the ground. "She always said that--'perhaps next year.'"

"But there never was a next year, was there?" the Ghost asked, keeping his eyes riveted on mother and son.

"No," Snape answered harshly, "My father despised me--and I returned the sentiment with all my being. All he ever did was scream at me…but I didn't hate him for that. It was when he screamed at _her_."

Snape didn't seem to be speaking to the ghost--more or less to himself. The ghost gave no hint that he heard Snape at all and continued to watch the scene in front of them.

Mrs. Snape smiled with effort. "But I do have another surprise for you."

"What?" her son asked, somewhat despondent still.

"What if I told you that you're going to have a little brother or sister?"

Young Snape's eyes widened. "You mean--you're having a baby?"

His mother nodded, her joy evident. "That's right…you won't be alone anymore."

"Well," the boy said, thoughtfully "I suppose it would be cool to teach him things…maybe even a few spells before he goes to school."

"Do I have your permission, then?" Mrs. Snape said dryly.

"Yeah, I guess," Snape replied, completely poker-faced.

The two looked at each other and started to giggle. Mrs. Snape reached forward and embraced her son. "My little Severus…you're growing up so fast."

Snape turned away from the scene, his eyes tightly shut, his hands clenched into fists.

"You never had a brother or sister, did you, Severus Snape?" the ghost questioned softly, the giggles between mother and son still audible.

Snape didn't answer the ghost. He continued to keep his back turned

"And your mother never came to visit again for Christmas, did she?"

Once again, his only reply was silence.

The ghost paused briefly and then touched his shoulder. "She died a week before you came home after your second year of school. An accident…tripping down the stairs…"

"Like _hell_ it was an accident," Snape snarled at the spirit, his black eyes flashing, "He pushed her--that filthy pig pushed her, I know it!"

The ghost didn't do anything to pacify him or correct him. He merely stood, his great green eyes looking into his.

"I went to Dumbledore about it," Snape remarked, sounding much calmer now, letting out a scathing laugh, "As if he could fix everything. Although he asked some of his Auror friends to look more deeply in the matter…all they could discover was that my father's story was slightly 'suspicious,' but there was no conclusive evidence to prove it!"

He stopped to take a deep breath. "But Dumbledore knew the truth. I'm not sure what he did…but he must of put the fear of God into my father. The beast hardly even stayed in the same room with me for the rest of his life."

"Yet, after Dumbledore had tried to protect you and discover the truth, you still turned to the Dark Lord?" the ghost asked, pausing for a moment before adding, "And you also broke your promise--you started reading the Dark Arts books again."

"I _never _broke my promise," he answered, furious, "I said that I wouldn't as long as she was around to raise me--and I started reading the books again after her funeral. And as for Dumbledore…I was grateful to him when I was young…for showing pity to a boy who could find none anywhere else."

"Pity!" the ghost remarked, in mock surprise, "But I thought that pity was 'weakness masquerading as charity-- infirmity parading as kindness!'"

Snape opened his mouth, only to realize that the spirit was using his very words against him.

"But never mind," the spirit said, "We have other things to see tonight."

Extending the ghostly broomstick to Snape once more, the ghost and Snape lifted off the ground again and landed, this time, in the dungeons, which were looking very festive, indeed.

"Severus!" said a buoyant voice from the other side of the room, "Rodolphus! Come help me move these tables! We must have this place ready in an hour for the party!"

The voice belonged to none other than Horace Slughorn himself. He was a short, rotund man, with quickly thinning blondish hair and a huge mustache. He was wearing a scarlet-colored pair of robes for the evening, which looked as if they were straining at the seams.

"Of course," Snape murmured out loud, "I was an in and out member of the Slug Club--he remembered my mother and thought I was brilliant in potions, but saw that I had no family relations to boost himself to more comfort. And this is Old Slug's Christmas party. It was the highlight of the year for the entire school."

"And yours as well?" the ghost asked, smiling slightly.

Snape coughed. "Oh--well. I could take it or leave it. Only a foolish party, you understand."

But the spirit seemed to understand Snape's delight more than Snape did himself. He watched his younger, sixteen-year-old self levitate tables with his wand, shouting things to Rodolphus Lestrange every so often, smiling a very rarely seen smile. And Snape followed his younger self's every movement, his black eyes sparkling with something that was not malice.

Time flew by. Students poured in, as well as teachers. Snape had a remark for every person that passed by, some scathing, but other times, more often than not, reminiscent. Then, unexpectedly, Slughorn lead a young Sprout on the dance floor and did a marvelously funny jig. The entire room of students burst into laughter, not knowing that amongst them, a foul-tempered, moody Potion's Master was joining in with their mirth!

Just as Snape regained control of himself, giving the ghost suspicious glances, as though he would inform the entire student body of his unprecedented outburst, Narcissa Black walked up to the young Severus Snape. She was incredibly beautiful, even at such a young age, with golden flowing hair, china blue eyes, and a smile that made every male in the room feel slightly weak in the knees.

"Hello, Severus," she said, smiling, "Happy Christmas."

"Happy Christmas, Narcissa," he replied, gulping ever so slightly, "Where's Lucius?"

Narcissa frowned. "Who knows? Off and about, I suppose, plotting something idiotic."

The music went from a jolly jig to a slower dance number. Awkwardly, the young Snape stepped forward slightly. "Er--would you like to dance with me--until Lucius comes back, of course."

Narcissa smiled. "I'll keep dancing with you even if Lucius comes back. He'll have to wait his turn."

At the beginning of their dance, young Snape looked incredibly nervous and slightly shy. But as Narcissa continued talking, his confidence grew, until the point that her laughter at the things he said could be heard on the other end of the room.

"The best night of my life," Snape murmured out loud.

"What was that?" the ghost asked.

"Nothing," Snape quickly lied, "I just remarked that it was a--a very merry Christmas for me."

"Strange," the spirit said, "I thought that the fool who walked around with the words 'Merry Christmas' on his lips deserved to be boiled in a vat of your Draught of Anguish?"

Once more, the spirit had used his own words against him. Snape looked away and frowned, thinking over the other things he had said in that office that morning.

"Come," the ghost said, as young Snape and Narcissa left the dance floor for a bite to eat, "We must move on."

This time the scene was not so jolly, yet--as Snape's memory served him correctly--it was only a year after the scene from Slughorn's Christmas Party. Still, young Snape looked older, colder--and more bitter than ever.

He was seated in the dungeons, his breath becoming puffs in the cold winter air, deeply engrossed with the dark bounded, slightly foreboding looking book. His black eyes were shrouded by his black eyebrows, which were pointed downward in serious contemplation. The lines in his face had just begun to appear, lines that would become much deeper as the years went by. And, replacing the shy, ironic smile from the last scene of the past, a scowl darkened his features, making them uglier than ever.

Suddenly, the door opened. Narcissa Black walked slowly towards the deeply engrossed boy. But she, too, looked different. She didn't seem to be so young and bubbly. Now she was a beautiful yet saddened woman who didn't appear to smile often.

"Severus," she said, softly.

He looked up from his book disinterestedly. "Yes?"

"Do you know what time it is?" she asked.

His expression slid to one of deepest irritation. "Damn it--I'm so sorry, Narcissa--I completely forgot. I just got so--"

"Preoccupied?" Narcissa inserted, her own voice full of bitter irony, as though she had heard that once before, "Yes, I see--just like every other time I asked you to be somewhere."

She sat down, gently spreading her pretty blue robes over the chair. Snape frowned at the blonde beauty. "It's not like we're actually going together, anyway. You seem to be on the arm of Lucius Malfoy all the time now."

"Because you have given me no other choice," Narcissa replied, her voice shaking with sudden emotion, "I have been replaced in your eyes."

"Replaced by what?" Snape asked.

"By that," she answered, pointing at the book scornfully, "And all the other Dark Arts books you submerge yourself in--and all the spells that you do and learn in the dungeons at night with the other boys, all in the name of the Dark Lord--"

"The Dark Lord is my future, Narcissa," Snape explained, slightly impatient, "Under his leadership, his servants will rise to positions of power and esteem! Would you prefer to see me selling Potions in Diagon Alley, barely getting enough money for all three meals, or helping free the wizarding world from those Muggle-loving fools?"

Her blue eyes glimmered with tears now. "When I first talked to you, last year at the Christmas Party, you were more than happy to spend the rest of your days reading books and working at Diagon Alley--poor, yes, but content. And then the Dark Lord came…and you changed."

"I was a boy," he scoffed, "A boy with a stupid, insignificant dream. No one lives happily ever after!"

"Yet I cared dearly for that boy with a stupid, insignificant dream," Narcissa quietly whispered, tears pouring freely now, "I could almost say that I loved him--sarcastic as he could be, impatient as he sometimes was--but I still loved him and his foolish dreams anyway."

She rose from her seat, brushing back her long blonde hair as well as her tears.

"I release you from any further attachments to me, Severus Snape," she firmly said, "I have--I have agreed to marry Lucius. He has proposed--and my family is in utter ecstasy at such a fine match. But just know that I loved the boy you were and not the cold, insensitive man in front of me. May you be happy in the life you've chosen!"

With one more heart-wrenching glance at him, Narcissa fled the room, off to the party where her fiancé and host of friends awaited her.

The real Snape had watched all this with a blank face. But as she was leaving, he urgently hissed, "Follow her, you idiot, follow her!"

But the young Snape gave no sign of hearing his older self and remained at the table, giving only a distant glance at the door before returning to his dusty volume.

"No more, ghost," the older Snape shouted, adamantly, "Show me no more!"

"Only one more, Severus Snape," the spirit replied, touching his arm, handing him the broomstick once more.

Despite himself, Snape wrenched the broomstick out of the ghosts hand and left the dungeon. When they arrived at their destination, Snape realized they were not in Hogwarts. They appeared to be in a very opulent house, with a gaggle of House-Elves cleaning here and there. The mistress of the house sat by a large chair by the fire, looking positively lovely. Her long golden locks were pulled back in a majestic uptwist, her robes were fitting of that of the highest rank possible--but she still seemed to be as melancholy as before. Narcissa Black, now Malfoy, was the mistress of Malfoy Manor--but she did not seem to be any happier than the days she was at Lucius Malfoy's elbow at Hogwarts.

The door opened and a motherly witch put down a young boy, not more than four years old at the oldest, with golden blonde hair and large gray eyes.

"Mummy!" he cried, "Look what I made!"

He showed her a finger-painting of a lopsided Malfoy Manor, accompanied by stick figures of his father, his mother, and himself.

"Oh, that's beautiful, Draco," Narcissa told him, smiling in genuine happiness, "You'll have to show your father when he comes in."

Speak of the Devil, his father entered.

"Daddy!" Draco cried, "Look!"

Malfoy took a glance at the picture and waved his son away with, "That's nice, Draco."

The boy, slightly put out, was lead away by his nurse, casting a sad, disappointed face at his father as he went. Narcissa didn't miss this.

"Could you have been less enthusiastic?" Narcissa asked, coldly, "He just wants to you be proud of him."

"He's four," Malfoy dismissively replied, "I'll have plenty of time to be proud of him, rather than pour almighty praise over a fingerpainting that looks like Dobby the House-Elf did it. And--anyway--I met an old friend of yours at Diagon Alley today--he was looking in the apothecary for something or other."

Narcissa turned her face away. "The only old friend of mine that would be in an apothecary would be Severus Snape."

"That's right," her husband answered, "He's apparently teaching potions at Hogwarts, under the crooked nose of that Muggle-loving fool! Just as the Dark Lord ordered asked him to, three years ago. Isn't that pathetic?"

Narcissa tried in vain to smile with her husband but failed miserably. However, Malfoy didn't seem to care about her thoughts toward the subject of Severus Snape and continued talking about his important business with Fudge. Narcissa turned her face away from him as a tear slid down her pale cheek.

"Enough!" Snape exclaimed, unable to watch any longer, "Take me away from here, you cursed ghost!"

"These are the things that have already been--don't blame _me_ for how they turned out," the ghost replied, with a contemptuous laugh.

The crown on the ghost's head, as it had done on all other occasions when they were moving from scene to scene, glowed brightly once more. In a wild, irrational attempt to stop any more terrible memories, Snape reached for the ghost's head--possibly to block out all the light as well as choke the spirit causing it. But it was no use--the more his hands covered, the more light shone through. Then, before he knew it, he was gripping his bed curtains, the spirit no longer there. Once more, for the second time that long night, Snape fell into bed and into a heavy doze.


	3. The Ghost of Christmas Present

_Part Three: The Ghost of Christmas Present_

Snape woke in mid snore, at the chiming of the clock. Sleepily, he heard it ring once and then twice. He kept his eyes tightly closed, as though trying to keep away his spectral visitor by pretending it wasn't there. However, as the painful seconds went by, not a sound was heard. Not the rattling of chains or a gentle voice. Snape had only dared to hope that that really _had _been all a dream, when he opened his eyes and saw a beam of rosy light traveling from his closet through his bed curtains. With a grunt, he sat up in bed and slowly moved to the closet.

"Severus Snape!" came a vaguely familiar voice from inside the closet, "Come!"

Wondering how in the world they were going to fit into his rather small closet, Snape opened the door.

Now, as both a cynic and a teacher of young wizards, nothing much surprised Snape. But the sight in his small closet made him gasp audibly.

The closet had miraculously become a gigantic room, the size of which could rival the Great Hall. It was decked out in an entire forest of holly, mistletoe, and ivy, which seemed to sprout out of the very walls and even dangled from the ceiling. A huge, roaring fire burned on the side of the room, overwhelming Snape with its sheer heat and power. But, by far, the most astounding thing in the room were the piles of candy--huge mounds of Chocolate Frogs, Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, Pumpkin Pastries, Sugar Mice--even stacks of Muggle candy, as well. Many of the piles were taller than Snape himself. But what occupied Snape's attention the most was the man on top of one of these great piles. He wore dark green robes with a fur trim. On his white, long hair he wore a wreath of holly, decorated with icicles. Down from his similarly colored, long beard, Snape saw he had no shoes on, instead, letting his old, weathered feet dangle freely. In his hand was a torch, glowing with the same ethereal light that the first spirit's crown had done before.

But none of that was what caught Snape's avid attention. He blinked several times, as though trying to deny what he was seeing.

"_Dumbledore_?" he asked, incredulously.

The ghost's bright blue eyes looked benignly at Snape. "No--I'm afraid not. But don't feel badly--I've been mistaken before. We do look quite alike…I collect his Chocolate Frog Cards."

The spirit gestured to a large pile in the corner, a collection of Chocolate Frog Cards more expansive than even the Weasley kids' collections combined.

Snape turned his attention back to the smiling ghost.

"So--who are you?" Snape asked.

"Oh," the ghost replied, "How terribly rude of me. I'm the Ghost of Christmas Present. Come and know me better, man."

Snape, who had been standing at a more comfortable distance away, edged closer, keeping a watch on the ghost's torch.

"Have you not seen the likes of me before?" the spirit asked.

"Well," Snape reflected, "Unless you're counting Dumbledore…no."

"Not one of my brothers and sisters?"

"I don't think so," he answered, almost saying 'hope not' instead of 'don't think so', but luckily catching himself just in time, "How many do you have?"

"More than eight hundred," the spirit answered.

Snape smirked. "I imagine buying Christmas presents must be an expensive affair."

The ghost didn't answer. Instead, he extended the arm of his robe. "Touch my robes!"

Snape, hesitated slightly, but determined that it had to be better than flying on transparent broomsticks. He grimaced and gripped it.

Luckily, this time Snape was not forced to fly. Instead, he miraculously appeared in a bustling town, apparently on Christmas morning.

"Is this a Muggle town?" Snape asked, his disgust heightening.

"Yes, indeed," the spirit answered. Hearing Snape's unmistakable revulsion, the ghost added, "And they celebrate Christmas the same as wizards, Severus Snape."

As they walked through the town, children, off from school, were hurling snowballs cheerfully at one another. Mothers called family members in for Christmas dinner. Fathers shoveled driveways, giving their neighbors a slightly out of breath yet joyful Christmas greeting. The sight of these Muggles, vastly different than Snape's father, made the formerly appalled Potion's Master thoughtful. As though reading his mind, the spirit said, "Sometimes, Severus Snape, good in life is rather difficult to unearth--humans have to seek it to find it. Ah--we are getting closer now."

"Couldn't we have just--appeared there?" Snape asked, annoyed, "Rather than have to trudge through that bloody Muggle village?"

The ghost smiled gently. "Ah, but just appearing in someone's house is remarkably rude, Severus Snape."

Snape, with his unquestionably shrewd mind, knew that the spirit was not being entirely truthful about his reasoning--after all, no one could see them, why did it matter if they appeared in someone's house or not? But the spirit had wanted him to see the town, the village full of happy Muggles, so brimming with something he did not have.

The Potion's Master shook himself of these illogical thoughts and focused his entire attention on the softly falling snow.

"Here we are," the ghost declared.

Snape saw a rather bizarre looking house. On the bottom, it resembled a large, stone pig-pen. However, over time, rooms had been added on, haphazardly, until it was several stories tall and looking rather crooked. Several chimneys, pouring out smoke from the busy cooks inside, were poking haphazardly out of a red roof. Snape glanced to his right to see a sign pronouncing the house's name as "The Burrow."

"Of course," Snape murmured, recognizing the house, "The Weasley clan used to live here."

In one of Snape's rare fits of imagination, he remembered an old Muggle rhyme from his childhood.

There was a crooked man and he went a crooked mile,

He found a crooked sixpence beside a crooked stile.

He had a crooked cat which caught a crooked mouse,

And they all lived together in a crooked little house.

Yet, with a strange, intuitive feeling (intuition was a strange feeling to Snape, anyway, as he had done his best to ignore his intuition for the last twenty years or so), he felt that there were no crooked people living within the crooked house.

The Ghost of Christmas Present stopped but a moment to gently touch its torch against the door, almost to bless the residence, and stepped inside with Snape trailing behind.

Snape's first impression of the Burrow was mass confusion. Three children scurried about, all excitement and laughter. The oldest one, who happened to be a seven-year-old girl by the name of Minerva Weasley, named after her mother's favorite teacher, was setting the table with an attempt at a solemn expression, which continued to break into giggles at the sight of her younger brothers, the six-year-old family twins, Arthur, named after their grandfather, who had died recently, and Albus, after their beloved headmaster. They appeared to be playing some strange game of tag around the dinning room table which had no rules that were observable to mankind. But they were enjoying themselves immensely.

Suddenly, from the door, Ronald Weasley walked in, looking rather flustered. "Stop that, boys. Your mother will be home from the store soon and you _know_ how she hates it when you run around the dining room. Go out and play in the snow. And don't forget your snow boots!"

The boys, most likely not heeding a word their father said besides "play in the snow," dashed out of the room, giggling.

Ron shook his red-haired head. He was tall and lanky, with Weasley brown eyes and red hair, and had a smattering of freckles across his face.

"I'm not sure what we're going to do with them, Minerva," he remarked, rubbing his oldest child's head affectionately. Minerva giggled softly and replied, "Not sure, Dad--maybe feed them to a hippogriff."

"Yes, but your mother would be rather upset with me," Ron remarked, grinning, "I'd better go make sure they don't scare any of the neighbors."

Ron had no sooner left when his wife walked in the front door, holding the youngest Weasley child's hand. On first glance, Snape could see an unhealthy paleness on the child's face. She had a shoulder length braid of brown hair and very large brown eyes that seemed to be older than what she really was, a mere child of five. The girl was live and real enough--but she had a transitory sort of look, reminding Snape of the ghost of Hogwarts. She bore with her a tiny crutch which she limped gently with, smiling at her older sister.

"Little Luna," Minerva said, greeting her sister, who was named for a certain Ravenclaw who died defending Hogwarts during the last battle, "Go and get washed for dinner. How was the Christmas play?"

"Very good," Little Luna replied, "I wished _I_ could have held baby Jesus, though--or maybe one of the sheep."

Reflectively, the child walked off to the bathroom.

In came Ron, with the boys, who greeted their mother with shrieks of delight.

"It should be Christmas everyday," Granger remarked, "I never am so popular as when I cook Christmas dinner."

The boys dashed off to bathroom as well, pushing each other along the way.

"How was Luna?" Ron asked, as Minerva followed along as well, scolding her younger brothers from behind.

"Good as gold," Hermione answered, "She's such a solitary child, though. Luna likes to sit and think of the strangest things…she said she hoped that everyone saw that Jesus was a little baby, that even little people can do great things--just like her."

Her voice shook slightly. Ron squeezed his wife's hand. "She'll grow old and get married, just you wait and see." Snape didn't miss the disbelief in Ron's voice.

A moment later, the children poured in, walking behind Little Luna in a solemn procession. The Weasley's sat at the table, said a brief grace, and then let the chaos of Christmas dinner ensue, involving passing food in two different directions, Hermione catching many dropped spoons and cups with a quick flick of her wand, and a heated argument between the twins and Minerva about which two should pull the wishbone.

But Snape seemed occupied with Little Luna, who kept her large eyes on everyone, smiling distantly, almost a little sadly, eating in her habitual quiet.

"Spirit," Snape asked, feeling a strange interest in the girl, "Will the child live?"

"I see an empty chair," the ghost replied, his normally jolly face darkened with sadness, "An empty bed and a crutch without an owner--yes, if these shadows remain unaltered, the child will indeed die."

Snape couldn't begin to fathom the strange feelings in his chest--his icy heart thawing, perhaps? Or his stagnant soul stretching for the first time in ages? But, within the last hour of watching the girl, Snape felt indescribably attached.

"No," he said softly, "No, spirit. Don't say so."

"The Future is not my department, Severus Snape. And that would help keep down the surplus population, now wouldn't it?"

Snape opened his mouth to retaliate, when he heard Ron stand to his feet. He, apparently, was giving a toast.

"Merry Christmas everyone!" he declared.

"And God bless us," Little Luna added, "every one."

Apparently, it was a family tradition to toast someone not seated at the table. Ron toasted the departed Albus Dumbledore, (Snape was positive he saw the ghost's lips twitch upward ever so slightly) Minerva toasted a friend of hers, the twins jointly toasted a teacher, and Granger stood up for her turn.

"I'd like to toast--Severus Snape, the man who has unwillingly but unknowingly taught me all that he could and is the last step to getting my job."

Ron snorted in disgust. "Yes, Severus Snape…I'll bet he's doing everything in his power keeping you from getting a job. Such a shame he isn't here--bloody prat."

"Ron," Hermione sharply replied, "The children--and on Christmas?"

"Well, I'm sorry," he said moodily, "But he is! He's a bitter, nasty, heartless man that doesn't care about anyone but himself. And if you so wish to toast him on Christmas, so be it, for I shall not toast that man on any other day but this one. To Severus Snape--a happy and merry new year, as if he'd ever use the opportunity to be merry and happy."

Everyone drank a sip of their pumpkin juice, remaining sober for a few minutes, until Ron started imitating some of his fellow Aurors at work, causing a fit of giggles to fall upon the whole company.

They were not a very wealthy family--it appeared that everything was kept from falling apart by magic only Hermione could conjure. Snape spotted a miserably tattered volume of Moste Potent Potions which looked as if a heard of centaurs had run over it. Yet, for all their problems, they were a happy, loving, and grateful family.

As the spirit signaled Snape to leave, he kept his eye upon Little Luna, who was reading one of her new books she received for Christmas, and continued to look at her until the door shut firmly behind him.

A moment later the spirit whisked him away, back to Hogwarts. This time, however, they were in the same rather large dungeon that Slughorn had used for his party--except this time Flitwick was the host.

The Hogwarts teachers were all gathered in a circle of chairs, chatting amiably over glasses of Butterbeer (or perhaps some Firewhiskey, by the looks of some teachers). Something Flitwick had said had been horribly funny--the entire group seemed to be in fits of irresistible laughter.

Flitwick, drying a tear from one of his eyes, said, in his squeaky voice, "He called Christmas a humbug, I swear…and believed it, too!"

"More the shame for him," Minerva McGonagall replied, lifting her class as if in a fake toast, "Severus Snape wouldn't know fun if it bit him on the nose!"

The last certain body part caused the group to emit a helpless giggle. The owner of the rather large nose touched it subconsciously, his face scowling once more.

"He's a sad man, Minerva," Flitwick said, shaking his head, "And he could be outrageously funny if he'd only come out of that dungeon every so often, instead of burrying himself in his own bitterness."

"Snape's extremely smart, isn't he?" Sinistra asked.

"Smart?" replied a friendly, warm voice, "Brilliant is more like it. Best in our grade in just about everything…especially Dark Arts." The voice belonged to Remus Lupin. He was a thin man with a kind smile and graying brown hair. He had forsaken his tattered robes for new ones, as he now had a steady job at Hogwarts--at least for a little bit.

"Yet what is the good of it if he never uses it for anything?" Flitwick asked, "He'll just let his mind waste away in the prison he's created for himself."

"You talk as though he's being enslaved, Filius," McGonagall remarked, "Snape's quite capable of coming here today--he simply chose not to."

"Still, I pity Severus," Flitwick answered, "His seclusion from others just punishes himself--it keeps him away from ever having an opportunity to be happy. And I shall ask him to come to my party every year, hoping to drag him out for at least one Christmas before I retire."

After that, conversation turned away from such a depressing subject as Snape, a prospect of a game was started. Before long, the teachers began a game of charades, in which the teachers were absolutely forbidden to use their wands, especially McGonagall. Snape, despite himself, became steadily more interested in the game, until he, too, was calling out answers as though they could hear him. The ghost's blue eyes twinkled slightly as Snape became more and more animated, not hearing the ghost laughing softly to himself.

It was finally Flitwick's turn (after McGonagall left them guessing quite a while with her toadish imitation of Dolores J. Umbridge, which received uproarious laughter in response by those who had to work with and under her). He frowned heavily and glared at them, crossing his arms and walking stiffly around the room. There was a lot of guessing…and even Snape was clueless. Finally, McGonagall exclaimed, "Of course--Severus Snape himself!"

"I asked if it was a monstrous creature and you said no," Binns, the ghostly teacher who taught History of Magic, drolly said, "I think my question was incorrectly answered."

As his fellow teachers burst out into laughter, Flitwick contained himself and raised his glass in a toast. "To Severus Snape--may he have a most merry Christmas for the merriment he'll never know he gave us."

A moment later, the ghost touched Snape's arm and they disappeared into a dark and empty street. Snape couldn't decide whether to be offended at being made a joke of by Flitwick or begrudgingly pleased that he had been remembered.

"Where next, Spirit?" Snape asked, "What is this place?"

"The end of the line for me, Severus Snape," the spirit answered, smiling, his torch the only bright light in the dark, desolate street. "My time on this earth is nearly up. The next spirit will meet you here."

"Here!" Snape exclaimed, "In this God-forsaken place? Can't you take me back to my room again?"

The ghost's genial smile was replaced with a serious expression. "No, Severus Snape. And you have left others in this alley before. Do you not remember?"

Snape looked around the alley vaguely. Nothing struck him in particular. "No."

"Then look and see what you left."

The spirit pulled aside his billowing green robes to reveal two children, a boy and a girl. They looked up at Snape with hatred so complete, so horrible, that it seemed as if they were two demons and not two children. Snape stepped backward in alarm.

"They were not so frightening when you killed their Muggle parents," the ghost said, his voice loud and condemning, "When you killed them because you were in a hurry to leave and thought that was quicker than modifying their memories. These are their children, the babies you left to die in that gutter over there!"

The two children continued to stare at Snape hatefully, making him back up all the farther away.

"They--they weren't supposed to be here," Snape replied, his voice abnormally weak, "It was just a mission for the Dark Lord…they weren't supposed to see the Death Eaters I was helping. And--and I had to hurry…I might have killed the parents, but I put the Imperious Curse on a Muggle policman to investigate the alley…so the children would be found."

Snape tried to gulp but his throat was too dry, as the children and the ghost continued to stare at him. "Have they no where to go? No one to help them?"

"Isn't St. Mungo's still open?" the ghost coldly mocked, "Isn't the Auror department still functioning?"

Somewhere, a bell struck three times. Turning back to look at the ghost and the fearsome children, Snape saw nothing but the dark alley wall and the gathering mist. Then, with a thrill of rarely felt fear, Severus Snape saw the next of his ghastly company this evening: it was the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come.


End file.
